Should I publish in an open access journal?
BMJ 2019; 365 doi: https://doi.org/10.1136/bmj.l1544 (Published 18 April 2019) Cite this as: BMJ 2019;365:l1544Linked Patient Commentary
Open access: remember the patients
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There is a move by large funders to enforce open access in their research, and the Wellcome open-access policy will change on 1st January 2020 to only fund article processing charges (APCs) in fully open access journals; deliberately not funding open access charges in hybrid journals[1]. The aim of this change is to ‘support a transition to a fully open access world’. This policy is driven by the aim of transitioning journals to become open access, rather than simply making their own research available to a greater audience. Journals may well choose to chase the funder’s APC money, becoming fully open access, but this will be at the cost of barring their journal to authors who do not have funding to pay the increasing numbers of APCs that will be required.
A significant APC will shift the decision making as to whether a potential article is published from the journal editor and peer reviewers to the purse-holders of the APC funds, who could deny it getting that far. This is more benign in the case of Wellcome, where the APCs are not deducted from individual grants, but may in the short term reduce the spectrum of journals available to authors. However in the case of commercially-funded research or in institutions with more limited money, decisions by APC-fundholders could be made that stifles academic results.
Given Wellcome’s open access policy aims to shift the landscape of scientific publishing, journals becoming fully open access to meet these new requirements could charge a tiered ‘social pricing’ structure where research from these funders requiring fully open access journals (rather than just for their own research) are charged a premium. This premium could be used to fund the APCs in that journal of researchers who have little or no recourse to other APC funding. This would reduce potential publication bias based on funding, as well as creating an open-access-for-all environment.
[1] Wellcome Trust (2018), “Wellcome is updating its open access policy”, available from https://wellcome.ac.uk/news/wellcome-updating-its-open-access-policy [accessed 28 Apr 2019]
Competing interests: JS has accepted a Wellcome Trust fellowship
I would like to respond to two observations made by the authors.
“Clinicians and researchers focus their reading on journals specific to their specialty. To apply evidence, integrating research into practice, they need articles that are relevant to their needs. Subscription journals can prioritise the most relevant findings for their readers, with accompanying interpretation.”
A very valid argument. The most important thing to consider here is who these “clinicians” are and what is “relevant” to their practice. Let us take an example. A subscription journal publishes the latest research findings on Tuberculosis and charges a fee of 60$ to buy the article. A physician in England (TB incidence 9.2/100,000 in 2017) and the USA (TB incidence 2.8/100,000 in 2017) can easily get access to it from their institution or are able to pay for it. At the same time, a physician in India (TB incidence 204/100,00 in 2017) or sub-Saharan Africa (TB incidence >300/100,000 in many countries in 2017) will seldom be able to do that. This prevents the exposure of these physicians to the latest advancements in the diseases they are dealing with every day.
“And the challenge of accurately relaying science to the public becomes harder when media outlets easily pick up and misinterpret open access research.”
This is where I believe we are making a blunder. The debate on open access to physicians and health care workers of all economic and geographical background should not be intermingled with open access to the general public. They are two different problems and need different solutions.
And I believe the world of online medical databases have already shown us the solutions to both these problems.
Many medical databases require medical students to provide a certificate to show that they are in training to get a discounted rate to access the database. In the same way, health care professionals and researchers may be asked to submit a certificate to prove that they are in the field when they initially create an account. This way the number of subscribers will increase drastically and even if not free, the journal can charge a minimal fee. I believe the increase in subscribers will compensate for the reduction in price and eventually help maintain the revenue.
The solution for “misinterpreted” research by public or research has also been provided by the same online medical databases. This can be done by requesting every author to submit a simple and easily understandable interpretation of their findings along with the main paper. This can be freely accessible to anyone on the internet.
Competing interests: No competing interests
Ashton & Beattie report that PLOS ONE accepts 70% of submissions. Whilst that might have been true in 2013, a more recent and perhaps more accurate figure to report would be that as of 2017 PLOS ONE accepts about 50% of submissions, which is an equivalent rate to that of BMJ Open [1]. I would also question whether acceptance rate is a meaningful statistic at all when research is moving towards a 'publish first, curate later' [2] model. Simply not publishing, or batting manuscripts around various journals until one finally accepts it after a lengthy delay, consitutes a form of research waste and is something that ought to be avoided [3].
The argument that certain forms of open access encourage higher quantity is also true of subscription-based publishing. Predominantely subscription-based publishers routinely market their subscriptions to library consortia on the basis of price per article, the lower the better value. As the price of subscriptions that libraries can afford remains flat, subscription-based publishers have incentive to make their services look better by publishing more to reduce the apparent price per article that a subscription gets you. The publishers then further obfusctate this by bundling together journals full of chaff articles with journals full of higher quality material. But under so-called 'diamond' or 'platinum' open access publishing models where neither the authors nor the readers pay to support the publication process, there is no such dangerous incentive to erode professional standards.
The same point goes for "the challenge of accurately relaying science to the public" - this is just as much a problem with subscription journals as it is with open access journals, and the cited reference[4] does not actually mention open access at all but instead decries press releases about both open access and subscription research articles.
[1] Bo-Christer Björk, (2018) "Publishing speed and acceptance rates of open access megajournals", Online Information Review, https://doi.org/10.1108/OIR-04-2018-0151
[2] Stern BM, O’Shea EK (2019) A proposal for the future of scientific publishing in the life sciences. PLoS Biol 17(2): e3000116. https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pbio.3000116
[3] Tracz V and Lawrence R. (2016) Towards an open science publishing platform [version 1; peer review: 2 approved]. F1000Research, 5:130 (https://doi.org/10.12688/f1000research.7968.1)
[4] McCartney M. (2016) Who gains from the media’s misrepresentation of science? BMJ 2016;352:i355. doi:10.1136/bmj.i355 pmid:26810502
Competing interests: I am Director of Open Access Programmes at Arcadia, a charitable fund of Lisbet Rausing and Peter Baldwin https://www.arcadiafund.org.uk/
Dear Editors
I am responding to Chris Zielinski‘s rapid response in which it was stated that:
“According to the Directory of Open Access Journals (DOAJ) (https://doaj.org/), there are currently (18 April 2019) 13,055 open access journals being published, of which 9,570 (73.30%) do not have an article processing charge, while 3,427 (26.25%) do, with no Information for 58 (0.4%) of the journals.”
As the rapid response refers to possibly of “patients” as readers, and the original article was written in the context of publishing in biomedical field, it would have been more relevant to consider only open access journals in medical subjects (722) of which 478 (66%) do not have an article processing charge, while 227 do, with no Information for 17 of the journals.
More importantly the majority (3/4) of the open access journals listed in DOAJ without article processing charge are less than 4 years old, and many publishes only twice a year.
Perhaps this gives a better perspective on the contribution of open access journals without fees.
Given that there are about 5700 biomedical journals indexed with Medline (2019) out of at least 14,000 biomedical journals published worldwide (2011 estimate; no one seemed to have bothered to hazard a guess in recent years) the outlet for open access publication at no cost to authors and readers seemed to be a drop in the ocean as many of the Medline journals have far more frequent and regular publications.
Should a minority of articles skew thinking in both clinicians and the greater public just because it is free? Obviously not.
The expectations of unlimited access to published material is unrealistic and have lasting consequences; just look at the demise of the independent fourth estate now subjugated by external commercial and political interest and weakened by amateur citizen journalism and blogging due to a shift of consumption of information fretted by expectations of free access.
And I haven’t even touched on the controversy of some open access journals involving its relationship with big pharma
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/features/2017-08-29/medical-journals-have...
Competing interests: No competing interests
The model of scientific publication faces several challenges. The first is the difficulty of maintaining a high quality of peer review. The second is the multiplication and proliferation of predatory publishers. Finally, rapid and effective dissemination of the most up-to-date scientific evidence is needed. Incorporating several actions into the existing model will allow each challenge to be addressed in parallel.
The multiplication of predatory publishers combined with the growing number of scientific articles create an onerous situation for peer reviewers. The volume of solicitations becomes burdensome to manage and reviewers are rarely able to respond to all of them. The journals may address both concerns by waiving publication fees (in an Open Access model) for their community of productive editors and reviewers. This would be an incentive for the non-financially supported researchers and valuable for the journals. An experienced, effective and efficient editorial team will accelerate the diffusion of the most recent scientific research and the Open Access model (free to the journal’s editors and peer reviewers) will serve as a motivator to increase the current reviews. Properly implemented, a collaborative Open Access model would ensure the publication of high-quality works thus increasing their likelihood of being cited while simultaneously creating an virtuous income stream for the journal.
Developing and implementing a collaborative Open Access model will pave the way for the advancement of the scientific publishers toward its mission.
Competing interests: Associate Editor (European Journal of Anaesthesiology, Acta Anaesthesiologica Belgica) Academic Editor (PLOS) Section Editor (BMC Anesthesiology)
First, the “open access” model may improve the quality of scientific publications, because increasing readers are also reviewers (although some studies were reviewed by high-quality system, they are also risk mistakes, and subsequently, they were retracted), them include researchers, policy-makers and patients, etc.
Second, the conflicts of interest may widespread in scientific research, like deviations in science field, they may could not be eliminated completely. After all, the benefit is one of the main reasons for advancing.
Third, the reasonable publishing fee may be indispensable for scientific equity, because undesirable “Matthew effect” may cause science to deviate from equity and truth.
Competing interests: No competing interests
From the reader's perspective - whether he/she is a patient or not - Open Access (OA) is of course welcome. This is generally true for authors as well, since most Open Access journals don't charge for publication. The discussion here conflates free OA with the minority “author pays” publishing model.
According to the Directory of Open Access Journals (DOAJ) (https://doaj.org/), there are currently (18 April 2019) 13,055 open access journals being published, of which 9,570 (73.30%) do not have an article processing charge, while 3,427 (26.25%) do, with no Information for 58 (0.4%) of the journals.
I performed the same analysis almost exactly one year ago (on 25 April 2018). While the number of journals in DOAJ has grown from 11,294 in 2018 to 13,055 in 2019 - quite a signficant increase (over 15%) - the percentages of journals that do and don't levy an article processing charge have remained exactly the same.
So (happily) there is no evidence of any trend for more OA journals to use APCs, and it remains the case that three quarters of journals do not levy APCs. And, those that do use APCs generally wiave them for independent authors who are writing without institutional support, and for authors from developing countries.
Competing interests: No competing interests
The “author pays” publishing model gives way to authors directly or indirectly sponsored by manufacturers or otherwise conflicted at the expenses of objective science. Some so-called peer-reviewed open access journals would publish everything for a fee: https://moluch.ru/archive/124/34198/
Competing interests: No competing interests
Publishing in an Open Access Journal, Article Processing Charges and Duty of Care - A Trainee’s, A Junior Doctor’s and A Researcher’s Perspective
I read with great interest both the articles - namely, ‘’Should I publish in an open access journal?’’(1) by Matthew Kurien et al. and ‘’Open access: remember the patients’’(2) by Dave deBronkart, published in the BMJ. As a Junior doctor, a trainee and a researcher we wanted our point of views to be heard as well. On a day to day basis, we as physicians are required to utilise the best available evidence-based medicine during our practice of medicine to provide the best possible care to our patients. But sometimes few of us know ‘’How and from Where" this knowledge and practice has originated and how many barriers (which are not synonymous with Quality assurance) one piece of credible knowledge has had to cross before coming into the limelight and being useful and finally being incorporated into the code of practice.
As a researcher, we put in our blood and sweat to produce a piece of evidence-based knowledge by searching through and choosing the best possible and strongest piece of literature available on the topic. After that comes the process of choosing the best possible platforms for publishing our piece of work, and the biggest barrier we face is Article Processing Charges (APCs) which apply to the majority of ‘High Impact’ journals that have a strong readership. Generally, the range of APC is $2000-$3000, though there are a few very expensive journals as well (3). Junior Doctors who can also be in training and who have invested a considerable amount of time finding out the best possible evidence from the literature cannot possibly afford these kinds of APCs. So, in other words, they have to look in the direction of journals which have either a more manageable APC or no APC at all, but the tradeoff is the impact factor and broad-based readership. This in turn, has an impact on patient care as often good quality evidence-based knowledge might not be readily available to patients and their physicians.
The situation is worse for researchers and Physicians from low-middle income regions, where they do not have access to best possible available literature as often it is behind paywalls, and even if they manage to acquire the access to that literature then at the time of publication APCs are so high that they cannot possibly present their work to the academia of the world through better platforms (4).
To their credit certain Journals, including the BMJ, offer Fee Waiver to authors from countries in the Hinari Core Offer (5). Another initiative taken by some journals including The BMJ is the introduction of a Student version in their product line which offers free submissions for medical students (6). Other important solutions that we can think of are:
(a) No APC,
(b) Single yearly subscriptions for the authors or group of authors or institutions to allow them to submit a specific number/unlimited papers,
(c) Annual income based APC - different APC price slabs based on author’s annual income and
(d) Tiered APC – where APC is based upon the level of career point the author is on at the time of submission.
The above mentioned business models have been adopted by different publishing institutions and publishers. Some have adopted one of the above for yearly memberships and some for other different products they offer to the publishers. For example, the BMA offers both Annual Income-based and Tiered subscription rates for their members (7) and this can be adopted by different journals for determining the APC. BMJ Case Reports adopts the yearly subscription business model where subscribing authors can submit unlimited case reports to BMJ case reports (8).
There are different benefits of each strategy as it will make the process of submission more affordable for researching authors, with No APC option being the obvious choice for authors to help bring new knowledge into the limelight for the public, patients, students and other professionals.
References
1- Kurien Matthew, Sanders David S, Ashton James J, Beattie R Mark. Should I publish in an open access journal? BMJ 2019; 365 :l1544.
2- DeBronkart Dave. Open access: remember the patients BMJ 2019; 365 :l1545.
3- How much do publishers charge for Open Access? | Open Access [Internet]. [cited 2019 May 4]. Available from: https://www.openaccess.cam.ac.uk/paying-open-access/how-much-do-publishe....
4- Research to Publication | BMJ [Internet]. [cited 2019 May 4]. Available from: https://www.bmj.com/company/who-we-are/case-studies/research-to-publicat...
5- Fees and waivers - BMJ Author Hub [Internet]. [cited 2019 May 4]. Available from: https://authors.bmj.com/open-access/fees-waivers/
6- Authors’ Guidelines | Student BMJ [Internet]. [cited 2019 May 4]. Available from: http://student.bmj.com/student/static-pages.html?pageId=2
7- BMA - Membership [Internet]. [cited 2019 May 5]. Available from: https://www.bma.org.uk/membership/subscriptions
8- BMJ case reports. [Internet]. BMJ Pub. Group; 2008 [cited 2019 May 5]. Available from: https://casereports.bmj.com/pages/fellowships/
Competing interests: No competing interests